Glas 18 - Eng

Initiative for RECOM Initiative for RECOM
1
18/2014
April
Initiative for RECOM
2
CIP -
,
341.322.5(497.1)"1991/1999"
GLAS
!Glas Inicijative za Rekom. - Beograd :
Inicijativa za REKOM, 2012 (Beograd :
Publikum). - 28 str. : fotogr. ; 21 cm
Tira 1.000
ISBN 978-86-7932-048-3
1.
a) - - 1991-1999
COBISS.SR-ID 193321996
IMPRESSUM
!Te Voice is the ocial monthly publication of the Initiative for RECOM.
All issues are available on the website: www.ZaREKOM.org
News about the Initiative for RECOM is available on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ZaREKOM.
PerKOMRA.ForRECOM and on Twitter: @ZaREKOMPerKOMRA
Te RECOM team:
email: regional@zarekom.org Phone: +381 (0)11 3349 766 Fax: +381 (0)11 3232 460 Cell: +381 (0)63 393 048
Belgrade, Publisher: Humanitarian Law Center ISSN 2334-6744 COBISS.SR-ID 512389815
1
CONTENTS
EDITORIAL
!RECOM Becomes Likely..................2
IN THE NEWS
!Im Running the Marathon for RECOM in Belgrade, Pristina And Skopje..................5
!The Coalition for RECOM Met with Bishop Grigorije.................6
!The Veterans and Reconciliation in the Former Yugoslavia..................8
!Narcis Misanovic: Reconciliation is a Plant We Must Never Stop Watering ..................9
!Spasoje Kulaga: Veterans Must Be Included in the Peace-Building Process.................12
!Zvonko Lucic: Political Interests and Corrupt Elite Hinder Reconciliation..................15

!Gani Balaj: Priznanje krivice je preduslov za mir.................19
!Dalibor Trajkovic: Working With the Youth is the Path to Reconciliation ................21

!Boro Kitanoski: Understanding Each Other The Pillar of Sustainable Peace...............24
!Sladjana Bukovac: The Mystery of Mental Health.................26
INTERNATIONAL TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE
!American Soldiers on the Quest for Peace in Vietnam................30

INTERVIEW: Lea David
!Veterans Must Be Part of the Peace-Building Process.................32
European Commission. This document has been produced with the fnancial
assistance of the European Union. The contents of this document are the sole
responsibility of Coalition for RECOM and Humanitarian Law Center as project
holder and can under no circumstances be regarded as refecting the position of
the European Union.
2
Eight years ago, in May 2006, on the rst Forum for Transitional Justice in Post-Yugoslav
Countries the regional civil society debate began on dealing with the past in the context of
potentials, achievements and limitations of criminal justice, as well as in the context of the
victims need to know and remember what happened to each of them, and state obligations
to prevent the repetition of crimes. At the said gathering, the families of the missing persons
were the rst to support regional approaches and initiatives for the establishment of an
ocial regional commission. Tey deeply believed that a joint commission has greater
power to contribute to revealing the truth about the fate of missing persons and mass graves
than do national bodies. Strong support for the establishment of an ocial regional fact-
nding commission of war crimes and other serious violations of human rights came from
survivors and witnesses of war crimes as well, whose testifying in war crimes trials showed
them that the courtroom is neither the place for the voices of the victims, nor a platform for
personal truths about the suered wrong-doings.
Gradually, over the period of four years, in the debates of civil society there crystallized the
view that a regional commission, called RECOM, should be an inter-state commission that
would, among other things, draw up an individualized list of civilians, soldiers and police
ocers who lost their lives in the wars and in connection with them during the period from
1991 to 2001, accompanied with a list of detention places and names of persons who were
unlawfully detained, as well as persons who were subjected to torture. Te debate, which
we came to call a consultative process, eventually resulted in several other good things.
One member of the association of victims families was proud to have learned to listen to

!RECOM
Becomes
Likely
Natasa Kandi
Photo: Vreme
EDITORIAL
3
It is realistic that
the delegates would
complete their work
in May 2014, and
present Amendments
to the RECOM Draft
Statute in June.
others, while another, also from a victims association, stopped viewing others as enemies
upon hearing their confessions about what had happened to them during the war. Many
participants from victims associations resisted taking part in creating the Draft Statute of
RECOM, arguing that they do not have the necessary knowledge. Over time, they became
convinced that victims are best placed to express their own needs and expectations. A great
event was the Assembly of the Coalition for RECOM, held on March 26, 2011, when the
Draft Statute of RECOM was adopted. After that, the petition for RECOM was signed by
543,000 citizens of post-Yugoslav countries.
Te transfer of the RECOM process from the civil society to the
political level proved to be a dicult challenge. Obtaining verbal
political support was easy especially in the context of the 543,000
petition signatures for RECOM. However, the Regional Expert Group
for RECOM, consisting of personal envoys of Heads of State and the
Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, didnt start functioning until
two years after the adoption of the RECOM Draft Statute. In keeping
with the agreement between the Coalition for RECOM and Presidents
or members of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, delegates were asked to analyze
the RECOM Draft Statute from the perspective of the legal and constitutional capabilities of
each country to establish RECOM.
Croatian President appointed Zlata Djurdjevic, Professor at the Law School, University
of Zagreb; Serbian President appointed a judge of the Appellate Court in Belgrade, Sinisa
Vazic; Macedonian President appointed Luben Arnaudoski, member of his cabinet;
President of Montenegro appointed Sonja Tomovic-Sundic, Dean of the Faculty of Political
Sciences in Podgorica and his advisor for Human and Minority Rights; the President of
Kosovo appointed her personal legal advisor Selim Selimi; member of the Presidency of
Bosnia and Herzegovina Bakir Izetbegovic appointed Aljosa Campari, Deputy Mayor
of Sarajevo, while member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina Zeljko Komsic
appointed Goran Mihaljevic, a legal expert for Cooperation with the Hague Tribunal.
President of Slovenia and Serbian Member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina
have not yet named their representatives for RECOM.
Te rst meeting of the delegates, without the participation of the Macedonian delegate,
was held on September 6, 2013; the second on October 27, 2013; and the third on March
8, 2014. Delegates are expected to complete their work in May 2014, and to present, in
the rst half of June, to the heads of state and the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina
a document, titled Amendments to the RECOM Draft Statute which, in their opinion,
would enable the establishment of RECOM. Presidents and members of the Presidency

4
of Bosnia and Herzegovina shall be entitled to additional changes to the document. By
early September 2014, they will inform the Coalition and the public about the legal and
constitutional possibilities of establishing RECOM. Given that at stake are the amendments
to the RECOM Draft Statute, the Coalition is obliged to review and assess the compliance of
the amendments with RECOMs objectives and tasks, which the Assembly of the Coalition
for RECOM
2
stipulated as the minimum standard of the support to the interstate proposal
of RECOMs mandate. Following this, the RECOM process becomes an interstate project,
while the Coalition for RECOM will continue to compile the list of war casualties and
places where civilians and prisoners of war were detained, which will directly contribute to
the achievement of the basic tasks that have never anyway been subject to challenge and
criticism.
In the context of regional cooperation, RECOM becomes likely. Te support of international
criminal justice institutions has been unreserved. Te President of the ICTY, Judge Teodor
Meron, recently strongly supported
3
the establishment of a regional truth commission:
Te mandate of the Tribunal is limited to determining individual accountability of persons
accused of certain serious crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia. Te ICTY, however,
cannot serve as the sole or even the most important way to heal the wounds caused by the
conicts that have occurred. Instead, its work can serve as a context for a wider discussion
and as a supplement to the eorts that are directly aimed at reconciliation, such as the truth
commission at regional, national or international level, the program for determining the
common standpoint of the history, and the like.
Natasa Kandic
Te author is a coordinator of the Initiative for RECOM, and a member of the Team of
Advocates for RECOM

2 Te Assembly of the Coalition for RECOM, March 26, 2011, when the RECOM Draft Statute was adopted.
3 Daily Danas, March 26, 2014.
5
IN THE NEWS
Te Coalition for RECOM invites citizens to take part in the public action I Run for
RECOM which will be held as part of the marathons in Pristina, Skopje and Belgrade.
Trough the public action I Run for RECOM the Coalition for RECOM will take part this
year in the Pristina marathon, on May 11, 2014, on the same day when the Skopje marathon
takes place. Before that, on April 27, 2014, the Coalition will take part in the Belgrade
marathon.
Last year, the Coalition for RECOM took part in the marathons in Sarajevo, Zagreb,
Podgorica and Ljubljana, in which more than 300 individuals, mostly youth, ran the 5km
race, called I Run for RECOM.
!Im Running
the Marathon
for RECOM
in Belgrade,
Pristina and
Skopje
6
On April 6, 2014, a delegation representing the Coalition for RECOM met with Bishop
Grigorije of Zahumlje and Herzegovina at the seat of the eparchy. Te visit was organized
for the purpose of strengthening the support of churches and religious communities for the
RECOM Initiative.
A selective approach to victims is a major problem and it is very important that each victim
has his or her name, said Bishop Grigorije. He expressed the desire and willingness to help
by urging Milorad Dodik, President of Republika Srpska, to receive the RECOM delegation
and propose his own envoy for the coalition.
He promised to support the further institutionalization of RECOM as well as the eorts of
the Coalition to restore the names to the victims of the last war, because, as he said, this is in
the interests of all victims, regardless of their religion or nationality.
Informing Bishop Grigorije of the current achievements of the Coalition for RECOM,
Natasa Kandic, Regional Coordinator of the Coalition, said that only two presidents in
the region have not yet appointed their representatives to the Regional Expert Group for
RECOM, tasked with analyzing the Statute of RECOM in the context of the constitutional
and legal framework of each individual country in the region of the former Yugoslavia.
Tose two are the third member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Nebojsa
Radmanovic, and the President of Slovenia, Borut Pahor.
Separate committees for the missing persons and national public research centers for war
victims and victims lists in no way contradict the aim of RECOM, precisely because trials
!The Coalition
for RECOM
Met with
Bishop Grigorije
7
and separate committees help the future interstate commission to establish the facts, said
Kandic.
Te RECOM delegation included: Natasa Kandic, Regional Coordinator of the RECOM
process, Dzenana Karup-Drusko, public advocate of the Initiative for RECOM, Dragan
Pjevac, member of the Coalition for RECOM, and Nikola Knezevic, Regional Coordinator
of the Coalition for RECOMs relations with religious communities.
Nikola Knezevic and Natasa Kandic talking with Bishop Grigorije and priest Radivoje Krulj
Photo: Coalition for RECOM
8
In the states successors of the SFRY, one of the consequences of war is a large number of
veterans and ex-combatants, drafted and volunteers alike, members of state military
formations, but also those who belonged to various informal groups. Teir exact number is
unknown, but it is safe to assume that there are about a million and a half of them in all
the countries of the former Yugoslavia. Te vast majority of these former combatants are
dissatised with their social status and their access to social rights. Although this group is
often seen as nationalistic and extremist, there are among the veterans of all countries many
who engaged in peacekeeping actions after the war, and who strongly advocate the restoration
of good neighborly relations and sustainable peace-building. Tis issue of the !Voice is devoted
to the theme of regional reconciliation and potential contributions of veterans to that process.
Nora Ahmetaj interviewed the veteran from Kosovo, while other interviews in this issue were
conducted by Jelena Grujic Zindovic.
!The Veterans
and Reconciliation
in the Former
Yugoslavia
9
My normal world ceased to exist on June 17, 1992, when at exactly 3:45 in the morning,
the special forces from Nis with tanks and APCs entered my part of town, with a mission
to clean up that part of Sarajevo, which was close to the airport. Tey set our apartment
on re, then they killed my brother, then my father - and so, although I was only 11 years
old, I immediately joined the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, says Narcis Misanovic,
President of the Association of Demobilized Soldiers of the municipality of Novi Grad in
Sarajevo, who is known across the region as the youngest demobilized soldier in Bosnia and
Herzegovina.
He says that after all the male members of his family had been killed,
he was ready to die, because he had no other choice but to defend his
family, his hometown and his country.
Even though I lost a lot, it does not give me any right to hate, and actually encourages me
to make sure, for the sake of my descendants, as well as all other citizens of our country, that
such a thing never happens again, and that no one ever experience what I have experienced,
that as a child I had to grab a gun to defend my very life, he said.
Why is support to RECOM so important for you?
When there was a debate as to whether the veterans should participate in RECOM, I said
Yes, because RECOM cant exist without veterans. Not all veterans have blood on their
hands. I divide the veterans into two types those who had to go to war, among whom I
count myself; and those who went to war to plunder and kill, and they are veterans only
Narcis Misanovic,
Bosnia and
Herzegovina,
the veteran of the
Army of Bosnia and
Herzegovina!
Reconciliation is a
Plant We Must Never
Stop Watering
!
Narcis Misanovic
Foto: factum.com.hr
For me, reconciliation
is a plant that we must
never stop watering.
10
nominally. Unfortunately, there are such persons in every war. Honourable veterans are
also victims. Because I did not have to go through what I went through. And if anyone has
the right to seek peace and reconciliation from the leaders of this country, its certainly
us. Most of the work has to be done in Bosnia and Herzegovina, because our country was
unfortunately the epicentre of the suering of all the peoples. One could talk about this in
statistical terms theres that aspect too, unfortunately but let those who suered less
rejoice. I am in favour of determining what exactly happened and how, who and how many
died, and I think this should be left to professionals. It is very important to dispel all doubts,
close all open questions, so that wars dont happen again. We are all living together again
today, and all the victims lost their lives in vain. But hey, politics has played a trick on us.
Te municipality of Novi Grad Sarajevo, which covers the organization I lead, is the largest
municipality in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and so the number of demobilized combatants
is huge about 25,000 people. Te organization alone has over 15,000 members. We keep
exerting pressure on the government to improve the situation of these people, as well as
of the invalids and family members of fallen soldiers. You know the saying First in war,
last in peace. War proteers emerged, people who really didnt deserve anything, and they
decide about us today, they run this country and get richer every day. Today, a member of
parliament gets approximately 6,000 marks a month, while a mother of one fallen soldier
receives 312 marks as her pension, or for two soldiers killed, she gets 516 marks. Tis is a
disaster. Tere are so many problems, that I do not know what needs to be done anymore.
What is it that makes one person ready for reconciliation, but not another?
It is my serious belief that all those hard veterans, who refuse
reconciliation, were bandits, thieves and war proteers who beneted
from the war in some way. Tese are the wolves of war. Tis situation
suits them, they are still getting rich, and it is precisely for this reason that they advocate
their hard position. Tey even get instructions on what position to pursue, and are
constantly in contact with the politicians. Tis situation doesnt suit normal, ordinary
citizens, and they are fed up with the violence and hatred. I cant imagine who in their right
mind wants to bury 400 or 500 people every day. Te wolves of the war were a minority, but
unfortunately they have prevailed.
What, in your opinion, is the role of the veterans in the reconciliation process?
At the beginning, the victims resistance to the veterans was enormous - of all victims
to all veterans. It took a while, but then people understood people who do not have
blood on their hands are accepted everywhere, and it is very important that they be part
of everything. Imagine our childrens reaction when they see three veterans, who until
recently were shooting at each other, sitting at the same table now, talking about peace
RECOM cant exist
without veterans.
11
Imagine our childrens
reaction when they see three
veterans, who until recently
were shooting at each other.
and warning that war should not happen again. For me, that eect we can have on young
people is the most important. It is important that those young heads be lled with the
right information, instead of evil and hatred. Tree veterans who can sit at the same table
now, that is a strong message of reconciliation. Second, and just as important, is that there
are many veterans who saw something, who know someone who committed a crime, or
know the location of a mass grave. We want to have boxes everywhere, where veterans can
leave a message anonymously about where and what happened during the war, in order to
motivate the veterans to do so, to help families nd their loved ones. Te veterans and their
organizations can do a lot this way, because everybody can do a lot for reconciliation in their
own area. Tis is why, from the very beginning, and at the very outset of the establishment
of RECOM, I have believed that veterans can contribute a lot. Each body found means a lot,
and so does the example to others set by such actions.
How would you assess the relations between the nations now, after the war?
When you listen to the politicians and watch TV, Id say no one
here likes anyone, but Im constantly travelling around Bosnia
and the former Yugoslavia, and nowhere have I experienced
anything bad. Ordinary people manage excellently, especially
considering how much our countries have fallen, above all
economically. Everyone is equally hungry, and that is the common thread that should unite
us in improving the situation. It started happening in Bosnia, and the protests werent
nationally driven. Tere may have been political parties that tried to take advantage of all
that, but initially the protests expressed the true spirit of the people. Teres hate in a smaller
part of the country, but every country in the world has that.
What is common to the veterans in the region? Is there anything that makes one side
dierent from another?
All veterans are struggling with absolutely the same problems before the war, people had
their jobs, their lives and their positions, they went to the war, and all they had, they lost in
the war. Tese are honourable people, who defended their people, and now they are where
they are. Companies sold, jobs lost, they are simply nowhere on the social map. No one asks
how they are going to manage, nor does anyone take care of them. We all have the same
social problems. We also have a similar view of the future. We are all saying that the war was
a great insanity, that it was all completely unnecessary, and that view is also what binds us.
Weve worked a lot on it, and expressed that view publicly, and talked about it everywhere.
I believe we have made a lot of impact. We visited the memorials of civilian victims of all
nations, bowed to the victims and laid owers, expressed condolences to all the families.
12
What is the reconciliation for you?
For me, reconciliation is a plant that we must never stop watering. Any relationship needs
cultivation, and so we have to constantly work on our relationships. We must introduce
the topic of reconciliation to schools, we have to constantly work on it. We all know what
Germany did in WWII, and it continues to work, to this day, on the topic of reconciliation,
allocating huge funds to it.
When you ask what veterans can do, you are asking what a 40-year old man can still do,
with the rest of his life ahead of him. Only a small number of veterans are over 60. Veterans
are generally young, and with war experiences which they would not wish on anyone. Tat
fact can be of use to society. Of course, a prerequisite for working with them is that they
undergo the process of dealing with their own past, but this is a process which the ethnic
group to which they belong should also go through, because thats the only way the whole
process of peace building can really be properly accomplished, says Spasoje Kulaga, one of
the most active veterans in Republika Srpska and the region as a whole. Within the REMI
Spasoje Kulaga, Bosnia
and Herzegovina
the veteran of the Army
of Republika Srpska
!Veterans Must Be
Included in the Peace-
Building Process
!
Spasoje Kulaga
Photo: personal archive
13
network (Regionalna mirovna inicijativa / Regional Peace Initiative), Kulaga works with
war veterans and other community groups to develop tolerance through various forms of
dialogue. He talks about how veterans can contribute to the prevention of violence among
young people, and towards the prevention of possible future conicts. For more than ten
years, he has been working on the issues related to dealing with the past. He is one hundred
percent disabled.
How successful, in your opinion, have we been so far in the peace-building process in
the region?
I would rst ask why some organizations governmental,
local and international keep trying to avoid working with
war veterans. We veterans often discuss this issue among
ourselves. Veterans are organized into associations to achieve
their social rights. However, they are not suciently involved
in the process of peace-building. Its a double-edged sword. Te veteran population in all
countries of the former Yugoslavia is huge.
During the war, the veterans were under the tremendous inuence of nationalism. If we who
work on the issues of reconciliation are not working with them, someone else will use them
for something else. If the nationalists appropriate them once again, they will turn them into
even worse nationalists. Veterans are made in and by the war, and therefore they should
not be thrown to the margins of peace-building. Veterans are not war professionals they
were people employed in factories, farmers, people who went to war and became soldiers.
And ever since they returned, they have no place to go. We need to somehow get them back
into society, to allow them to do their part of the job which would provide a living for them.
When we help them, we help their families, as well as the community in which we live, but
we also contribute to reconciliation.
What is your experience in working with veterans?
At the beginning we established veteran support groups, to help the veterans start dealing
with their own past. We interviewed veterans who had been forgotten on the margins,
included them in and brought them to a position where they were able to be creative, to
move. Ten we launched the programme, which is based on the constructive use of veteran
experience, and we are carrying it out in cooperation with the War Trauma Center from
Novi Sad. We formed a group of veterans, and educated them with the help of social
workers, psychologists, and activists. Ten we began establishing workshops on violence
prevention in high schools, in cooperation with non-governmental youth organizations.
Young people would always,
almost by default, recognize in
the events in their own families
the consequences that the war
had for war veterans.
14
We mostly didnt work with pure ethnic youth groups. But we ran a workshop with a
group in which the majority were Bosniaks. Young people would always, almost by default,
recognize in the events in their own families the consequences that the war had for war
veterans. Tey asked for explanations, especially for the violence they had often seen in
their immediate environment. When they start asking questions, it is dicult to bring the
workshop to a close. Te war has left a mark on their parents, whether they were members
of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, or the Croatian Council of Defence. At the end of
the dialogue they would often say words to the eect that, All the time, we had only been
given one story, but now we hear stories of the suering you experienced from our own
military.
We are now working on creating a multiethnic team of
veterans. Experiences of this kind can contribute a lot,
without promoting values that would oend anyone - to
the contrary, promoting the values and ideas of peace.
We want to show that it is possible to work together, even
though we were on dierent sides. Young people will
be presented with several perspectives here. Our job is to present them with our own
experiences. Tey are already grown-ups practically, mature enough to draw their own
conclusions from these stories.
Interest in the workshops is great, and believe me, wherever we have gone, an invitation to
come back has followed.
What is your view of the fact that young people you work with in Republika Srpska
perceive the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina as being a country more foreign
than any other really foreign country in Europe?
We were at war and we committed acts of evil against each other. It is normal to ask yourself
alright, its been 18 or 20 years, when will it stop? Look at any mother from any of the
people in Bosnia and Herzegovina who lost her son. She lives on, but she still cant get over
the loss, regardless of whether a Serb, Bosniak or Croat killed the child. Tere were many
wounded. Tere were many who took part in the war. Many people are politically active, and
have the experience of war. Tis whole situation with the media, and the general poverty,
are the elements that maintain the status quo. In the Federation, we have two gates in every
school for dierent ethnic groups, we have divided cities, a complicated state machine. So
when you look at this process of reconciliation, taking into consideration all these elements,
the moment of its bearing fruit is still a long way away.
Often in the non-governmental sector there are individuals who are there not because of
There is a genuine need for
dealing with the past in a
broader social context, so that
all who have survived the past
can learn something from it.
15
the idea of reconciliation, but because they know that this is the way to serve some private
interests, and then they distort the whole story. I believe that the majority of people working
on reconciliation are honest, and that they really have the veterans in mind.
Do you support the Initiative for RECOM?
I think that RECOM has not taken into consideration all aspects
of cooperation with all parties in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Why
cant you nd anyone from any organization of veterans in Republika Srpska, in order to
cooperate and do something with them? Many veterans in Republika Srpska are honest
folks, and many of them, like those from the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, have nothing
in their pockets but still rmly support the idea of peace. Tere is a genuine need for dealing
with the past in a broader social context, so that all who have survived the past can learn
something from it, and prevent it from springing back again tomorrow, in our childrens
generations.
In fact, since 1991, one and the same group has had tight control over everything
pertaining to the veterans in Croatia. Its a vicious circle which one cant enter and in which
pretty much nothing changes, and so neither do I do anything, nor am I a member of any
organization. No reason to pay for membership where you cant say anything meaningful,
says Zvonko Lucic, who spent more than a year on the battleeld near Mostar, where he had
responsibility for the group of people who were under his command.
Veterans are made in and by
the war, and therefore they
should not be thrown to the
margins of peace-building.
Zvonko Lucic, Croatia
!Political Interests
and Corrupt
Elite Hinder
Reconciliation
!
At rst it was very surprising
to see people who wore the
uniforms of opposite sides
together and talking, and it
was very difcult.
16
He says that people from the camp, whom he guarded, gave him a cigar holder as a gift,
which he still has, in gratitude for fair treatment.
Zvonko points out that after the war he became part of Hvidra (Te Association of Croatian
Homeland War Invalids) and helped organize the training of veterans for computer literacy,
but the programme was shortlived because funds stopped being allocated to it.
Now, he says, he occasionally participates in events organized by the Centre for Nonviolent
Action at projects of regional meetings of veterans.
At rst it was very surprising to see people who wore the uniforms of opposite sides
together and talking, and it was very dicult, but now it is quite normal and quite easily. I
now have friends in all the countries, and someone from among them wherever I go, he
says.
What were the taboo topics for veterans in the rst meetings after the war?
People were reluctant to say where they were and in what way they were involved during
the war. However, the distance in time and maturity have helped us see that period in a very
dierent way. Tinking about it in a critical way has helped us all. You cant have yourself
sticking only to your own rm position all the time; you have to make a compromise.
To learn and accept. I think that by now trust has been built between dierent groups of
veterans in the region, which was unthinkable before.
What was the motivation for the veterans to continue meeting, even though initially
they met each other with distrust?
I remember that at the beginning it was unthinkable even that humanitarians should sit
down and talk with the people who were in uniform during the war. Many were against
these talks. And then it turned out that something could come out of it all, and that veterans
too have a lot of potential. Curiosity helped in the beginning, and then what happened
was that, when all the sides stepped forward beyond their own positions, and when the
dierences insisted on by politicians and the media had been excluded, it turned out that it
was all essentially the same, all sides were the same. I see more hostility here between the
fans of two sport clubs than between us veterans from dierent countries. Tese are people
who all went through a lot of hardship. Many of them do not have arms or legs. And now,
after everything has been said and done, I think they view the past more critically, which
is the essential point to face all this, to face the question of whether it had to be like this,
and how to deal with it from now on. Common to all of them is the feeling that they are all
somewhat disappointed about what they had been a part of, about what happened and how
17
it all happened. Tey all paid for it heftily, with personal hardship and everything they now
have to go through.
It is often said that the veterans in Croatia are in the best position of all veterans in
the region. At the same time, however, Croatia has the highest rate of veteran suicides.
How do you see this reality in your country?
We have about 70,000-80,000 war veterans, and they all have benets
on the basis of that status. I know how it was in the war, and I know that
in 1995 there were 30,000 of them at the most. Its a turbo-ination.
Factually speaking, there are people who have not yet been registered,
or made use of their rights, so the gure will keep growing. Some have,
quite simply, bought this status, or have been helped by those who are in power. It may seem
to an outsider that veterans in Croatia do not want a change, that they are doing ne, but
this is only an illusion. Essentially, all veteran associations have been established politically,
and politics controls them. I was with Hvidra for two terms, and never in that time had
there been even a suggestion that some sort of inspection would come to check how the
money was being spent - money which was obtained from the state budget. Its never been
some huge amount, but still no one has kept a record of it. Such associations, just like the
church, do not need to worry about how they will present the use of the funds received.
If the associations are politically controlled, then surely the veterans attitude towards
the region and to the process of reconciliation is also politically controlled?
Of course, because reconciliation doesnt suit politicians. Tose who have erected fences
now do not want to change, nor do they want the fences to be torn down. Tere is a political
ultimatum either youre with us, or youre alone, and it is well known that anyone who
tries to go it alone will be blocked. In fact, there are many people who privately support
this story, but when it comes to their associations voicing the support publically, it is very
dicult.
What, for you personally, was the gesture or the event that has contributed most to
reconciliation in the region?
When the Croatian President Ivo Josipovic went to Bosnia and Herzegovina and apologized
- that was very nice, I think. You cant spend the rest of your life in a trench youve dug at a
particular moment. However, resistance to that gesture soon became apparent, and it was
obvious he had to do a lot of explaining as to why he had done it, why he went to the village
of Ahmici - and of course, that we are not to blame, and so forth. So many people live o
that, and people dont see how things really are, and dont understand. I once met a man,
There are many
reasons for
RECOM.
18
an engineer, who told me, I am a Serb by profession. He said that out of sheer frustration,
because in the 1990s he was laid o by the Koncar factory because of his ethnicity.
Politics remain riveted to the same positions, while certain groups of people remain by
profession members of their ethnic groups; just as among the war invalids there are those
who have received housing benets several times through various scams, and wont leave it,
because through it they have gained the most in their life.
A lot of the veterans obtained their status while still very young, and have done nothing
else since. How should one work with them to build reconciliation?
Te statistics shows that very few among them came from urban environments, but settled
there later. In essence, they were in practice being rewarded with their housing opportunity
in cities, and by pensions. Politics has determined what he should be in life, and he no
longer thinks for himself, nor does he think of the society that will not be able to go on
paying for it all forever. Weve had ten-percent cuts to our pension twice already. At one
time during the 2000s, one billion eight hundred thousand kuna per month was allocated
to veteran pensions, and now that amount is over three, or even three and a half billion.
Te budget simply wont be able to take that for much longer. And the consequence has
been that they have turned from young and healthy into disabled people, even when they
were not so. When they asked me to send them the documents and told me to just put my
signature to them, I was 35, so I asked them what I was going to do with so many years
in retirement? I did not want to sign. Six months later, I found out that I had the right to
go to school and not have to pay for tuition. So I graduated from
business information school. I sent out four job applications, and
got no response. And then the same woman again, before whom
I had refused to sign the retirement documents for the rst time,
asked me, What are you waiting for? Sign the papers. And so I
retired. I am now into grafting old varieties of apples and pears
near Topusko, thats where the thermal waters are said to be
excellent - and, to be honest, thats what I like much better.
Is there anything else the veterans can do, despite all the problems you are talking
about?
I think we as a society are not very active, and so we tend to wait for someone else to do
something. Tats the biggest political and veterans problem. It is simply a question of how
to turn something passive into something active, something that can create its own future. I
really dont know how that can be done.
Do you support the establishment of RECOM?
Those who have erected
fences now do not want
to change, nor do they
want the fences to be
torn down.
19
At rst, I took part in the discussions about it, on several occasions. Generally, my attitude
at the time was that if the judiciary is doing its job, there was little purpose to such projects.
Of course, in the meantime, life has corrected me, and I see that there are many reasons
to have RECOM. In fact, it turns out that things are either being suppressed, or not being
addressed. So now I think the opposite of what I used to think that there are many reasons
for RECOM, because none of our societies is able to do anything on its own.
During the Kosovo war, Balaj served with the Sabotage Monitoring Unit of the 123rd
Brigade in the operational zone of Pastrik. Today, this veteran is an engineer in Pristina.
Although his Kosovo colleagues had met with other veterans from the region, Balaj never
took part in those meetings.
In your own experience, how does a veteran see the peace-building process? Does this
social engagement help at all in addressing the issues of veterans integration? If so,
how?
I believe that every individual should contribute to peace and freedom. Te war was
imposed on us, the veterans, after many of our attempts to achieve freedom and peace
in some other way had failed. After much suering and hardship, as well as dealing with
many problems and challenges, we achieved the goal freedom, and for us this is of great
Gani Balaj, Kosovo
!Admission of Guilt
is a Prerequisite for
Peace
!
20
importance. Tis peace should be preserved and should not remain a burden to future
generations.
So far, our society has not taken any steps toward veteran integration, nor has the state done
so. Te category of veterans is somehow forgotten by everyone. However, veterans ought to
integrate and obtain their rights, because any good society, like any good person or friend,
should become a source of good in a period of need. When this country needed us, we
were on the front lines to protect our nation and our homes, and now, in peace time, we are
forgotten. Te veterans must be rehabilitated, they must obtain the right to the education,
employment and other benets to which they are entitled.
What is the cooperation between veterans in the region like? Have you ever met with
veterans from other countries, especially those from Serbia ?
No. Nor do I feel the need to meet with anyone before Serbia apologizes for the crimes it
committed, before the missing persons are found, before compensation for the damages
suered during the war is paid, and before Serbia recognizes us as an independent country. I
have never even met with veterans from Bosnia and Herzegovina or Croatia.
What is needed for the healing of a society that has gone through a major trauma? How
can the veterans of Kosovo help their community become cured?
We should not neglect any person who has survived the horrors of the war, nor should
anyone of us humiliate that person. Instead, they should be oered help in every way
possible, even if that only means kind words. All these people need rehabilitation and
special treatment by society. Forgiveness heals all wounds. However, the open wounds
should be closed rst the return of the loved ones whose fates remain unknown, and the
punishment of those who caused the trauma, rape, massacres and many other abuses which
cannot be described in words. Te responsibility for all the crimes of torture and genocide
by Serbia ought to be established rst, and only then can I say that Kosovo can heal,
through gradual peace-building and good neighbourly relations with Serbia, and through
a relationship between two equal states, eliminating contention for the sake of future
generations.
21
In the school hallways, I saw in the eyes of the students, before
meeting with them, that they viewed us as lm characters as if they
expected us all to look like Rambo, tattooed, covered in scars. But
when the discussion warmed up, it would never end at the scheduled
time, because they always had a lot of questions, says Dalibor
Trajkovic, who took part, as a soldier, in the ghting in Kosovo during
the NATO intervention against Serbia in 1999.
He was wounded in Kosovo. Since 2000, he has been devoting most of his time to dialogue
between the youth and the veterans, organized across Serbia by the Center for War Trauma,
based in Novi Sad.
Te meetings are, as he indicates, organized with high-school students, but also with other
groups of young people prone to violence, such as sports fans, inmates of correctional
institutions, oenders and skinheads.
Dalibor points out that most of the children had not even been born before the NATO
intervention and that they know almost nothing about that period, or about the wars in the
former Yugoslavia.
We have tried to translate the experience of war veterans into a message that violence or
involvement in conicts doesnt pay o. Trough various examples, we have managed to
explain to them that the war hurts everyone, on both sides. And the enemy even if he is a
soldier, has children of his own, a mother, a family, who suer too, he said.
Dalibor Trajkovic,
Serbia
!Working with the
Youth is the Path to
Reconciliation
!
Dalibor Trajkovic
Had someone told me,
before 2000, that I
would be sitting with an
Albanian at the same
table and talking, I would
tell him hes crazy.
22
What is the kind of question you most often get from the kids?
In the rst part of the meeting, while they still think we are all like Rambo or Te
Terminator, they are sure to ask questions like, Where were you, and how many of them
did you kill? In the second part, towards the end, their questions become totally dierent:
Are you in pain, does it bother you that you have no arm, what do you live on...? Tats
how big a change can happen in a young person after only two hours of talking. So I think it
is terribly important for this project, a dialogue of youth and the veterans, to continue, and
to be organized in every city. I strongly believe that this is the real thing. Te eects that the
programme has on bullying are huge, and then it all leads to better relations, generally, with
everyone in the future.
Are the childrens reactions indicative of the fact that the veterans hesitated to share
their experiences with their families after the war?
I am sure that all veterans have kept quiet after the war about what they
experienced, and especially do not talk about it with their loved ones. Its
one of the reasons why incidents occur, domestic violence, murder, even
mass murder or suicide. Our society keeps no record of it all. And yet, it
all stems from the war trauma, as well as from the fact that people who
have experienced combat have no opportunity to share that experience with others. Because
the most dicult part of that whole experience is actually the impossibility of sharing it
with someone else who has never gone through anything like it. Tats why people crack up
in all kinds of ways some do drugs, some drink, some ght, some go crazy. Tats why we,
the veterans, even though we were on opposite sides, understand each other very well. It
is quite dierent when youre talking about this extreme experience, and you hear and see
that someone has the same problems as you, that youre not crazy, but that instead you have
PTSD (post-traumatic stress syndrome).
What motivated you to engage in assisting other veterans, and later in working with
young people?
Completely by accident, I heard of the support groups of the Trauma Center in Novi Sad.
Nobody could convince me that I was sick, that I had a problem of any kind, or that people
were avoiding me. I just did not have that feeling, I did not even think about it. A friend of
mine then asked me to keep him company, and I sat next to him at the seminar. During
the rst break, I took him aside and verbally attacked him I asked him why he had shared
with others the information I conveyed to him privately, and now in the seminar they were
talking about it, even though I was not mentioned by name. I did not trust him, I was angry.
One of the doctors noticed this and spoke to me. He told me that these problems were not
I saw that I was not
at all as healthy as I
had thought, that I
had a problem I did
not recognize.
23
only mine, they were common. I was shocked. I saw that I was not at all as healthy as I had
thought, that I had a problem I did not recognize. And so I started working on accepting the
fact that I had participated in the war, and that I could not erase that part of my life. I started
learning to accept it. After everything I went through, I got a huge incentive to convey this
experience to young people, to teach them what war is, and to do everything I can so that
not a single young person is ever again manipulated. I wanted to show young people that
things were not the way they were represented in Serbia that were just great, that we
had only a few casualties, while in Croatia or Kosovo hundreds were killed, only soldiers of
course. We constantly praise our own, and denigrate others. And the truth is that we suer
as much as they do, that their states dont fulll their obligations either, that there too are
many people living without limbs. Simply, I want to say how things are, to explain that both
here and there people are living with the same problems.
What for you is the right path to sustainable peace?
Im still convinced that reconciliation can best be achieved by those who were directly
involved in the war. Tose people can be especially important in conveying the message that
not all Serbs are Chetniks, and not all Croats are Ustashas. Tat kind can be found in all the
countries of the world in Germany you still have Nazis today. Tere will always be those
who believe in such things. But we have to believe that change is possible. Had someone told
me, before 2000, that I would be sitting with an Albanian at the same table and talking, I
would tell him hes crazy. But if you can change one man each day, tomorrow he will change
someone else, and so it goes. What we need to convey is that over there, in that other
country, there are people too, not Albanians, Bulgarians, Croats, Bosniaks, or some other
ethnicity. Ten we need to change the young people we should change our own, and they
should change theirs, and then we should get these kids together somewhere, to see each
other and get to know one another, and so on. We dont have to love each other, but we can
respect each other. Tat, for me, is a path to sustainable peace.
24
We sat in a crowded hotel ballroom in Skopje, for a discussion at the promotion of a book of
real life narratives from the war in 2001. Te book contains the stories of refugees, and is the
third in a series of oral histories entitled Dealing with the past, the war of 2001, edited and
published by the Peace Action organization from Prilep. Toward the end of the discussion,
a retired general of the Macedonian Army took the oor. He spoke about the need to talk
about the war and to listen to each other, and he welcomed the work being done on a
project such as this. And then he told us that in the same room, exactly three years before,
at another meeting, he had encountered an Albanian veteran. Following that, in the past
several years they had gone through a lot together. Today, he said, he would want to call him
his friend. Te Albanian veteran was also there, a few metres away. Te book launch took
place in December 2013, while the other, earlier event, in November 2010, at which these
veterans had originally met, was in fact the rst national consultation between civil society
organizations in Macedonia concerning the Initiative for RECOM.
Although the veterans speech was generally heart-warming, Im aware that it was quite
simply an remarkable, very specic and infrequent kind of event. In 2010, I was the rst
coordinator of the Coalition for RECOM in Macedonia, and I worked on the preparations
for the consultations. I remember very well that half of the people who responded to the
invitation were veterans from both sides of the Albanian-Macedonian divide. Te veterans
were the most active in the discussion, and among the rst to express willingness to join the
Coalition for RECOM. And that same energy was preserved later on even. Tat in itself is
quite telling about the general climate in Macedonian society as far as the attitude towards
the war in 2001 and towards reconciliation are concerned. Everyone is happy to avoid
this issue, except for those who cannot.
Boro Kitanoski
!Understanding Each
Other The Pillar of
Sustainable Peace
!
Boro Kitanoski
25
A lot has happened in the meantime. Veterans organizations have merged and split, there
is a lot of hostility (not just along ethnic lines), and ingratiation towards the politicians; but
there are also sincere eorts. Much like everywhere else in the region. Commemorations
of military casualties are performed only on safe ground, within the ethnic community
to which the victim belongs. When the commemoration is dedicated to the other side
in the same place, the memorial plaque doesnt live to see the next day. Tere is a serious
conict over the rights of veterans (as to who should be covered by benets, for example),
which occasionally escalates, and then calms down. Tis dispute is not just a matter of social
support (nancial and institutional), but also a deeper conict over who has any right to the
legacy of the war. It is a clash of opposing narratives about the nature of the war. Despite
some exceptional individual phenomena, most of the events are tightly controlled by the
(ruling) political party. Hence, many questions are often broached for the sake of other
(non-veteran) interests, and then buried again. However, their very survival clearly indicates
the need for a dierent approach.
Two years ago, Defense Minister Fatmir Besimi made an ocial
visit to the memorial for fallen soldiers of the NLA/UCK in the
village of Slupcane. Te gesture provoked an avalanche of reaction
from the Macedonian side. Shortly thereafter came a proposal to
pass a law on the rights of veterans that would not cover the NLA/
UCK veterans, which in turn triggered a response from the Albanian
community. In the midst of this crisis, a prominent role was played by the then Member
of Parliament, Talat Xhaferi, a former ocer of the Macedonian army who had deserted
during the war and become the commander of the NLA/UCK, and quickly assumed the
position of Minister of Defense of Macedonia an oce he still holds. An idea emerged
among the public to organize joint visits to places of suering during the war, but on one
condition: If you visit our monuments, we will visit yours - a proposal that didnt pass in
the end, nor was even commented upon. Everything calmed down and things continued as
usual.
Te elections are coming up in April regular presidential and early parliamentary elections
and already the rst announcements are suggesting that nationalism will once again be the
main topic. I suppose that all parties will want to appropriate a segment of the aura of the
former combatants, something of the reputation which they enjoy in our deeply divided and
militarized society. I still remember some very humane, soothing and conciliatory responses
(which the media ignored) by some veterans associations, publicized on several occasions
over the past few years, when ethnic conicts exploded on our streets. And because of that,
I see a far greater threat to building a sustainable peace among those who never stop talking
about the veterans, than in the veterans themselves. Veterans could be an important pillar
The veterans were
among the rst in
Macedonia to express
willingness to join the
Coalition for RECOM.
26
of peacebuilding. How to set up this pillar is a question the answer to which Im still looking
for, but I am certain that understanding is the rst step in that direction. I do not think that
examples of friendship the likes of which I described at the beginning of this article must
be everywhere around us all the time, but we really do need mutual understanding to
acknowledge dierent positions and recognize the interests of all. Tat is what is necessary
for our common future.

Te author is the founder of Peace Action from Prilep, Macedonia
What follows is an excerpt from the book Te
Gender of Spectres (Rod avetnjaka), by Sladjana
Bukovac, writer and journalist for Croatian
Television. Te book deals with the topic of veterans
in Croatia after the war, and was described by critics
as one of the most exciting and most moving novels
written in Croatia over the last few years.
Two friends, Pavel and Vedran, professional
psychiatrists who treat veterans, are discussing,
Sladjana
Bukovac
!The Mystery
Of Mental
Health
27
after their regular weekly squash practice, the patient they had in common, who had
committed suicide a few days earlier.
Tis is truly bizarre, said Vedran. A few months ago he came to the E/R, I was on duty.
Minor myocardial infarction, extremely high systolic pressure. Quite common. You know
how many of these patients come to the E/R. But only a day before that, you had told me of a
theory by that guy, the American, you know, about the absence of fear.
Repeated exposure to injury and danger can make people indierent to serious self-harm -
Tomas Joiner.
And that was conspicuously present in him, the patient - he didnt give
a damn. His left leg and arm were sti, heart rate far above normal. He
didnt necessarily need to panic in this situation, but his indierence to
his own state was simply impossible to overlook. He wouldnt have even
come to the hospital on his own he was forced by his family instead. He
treated his body like a broken car. What am I saying - like a broken car? Every time I go to
my car mechanic, Im in a state of extreme anxiety.
Great. So, on the basis of the thesis Id recounted the day before, you predicted that my
patient, whom I had formally diagnosed with suicidal inclination, would actually commit
suicide. So much for me and my practice.
Oh, come on, how were you supposed to know that he wasnt afraid of death?
Te correct question would be, how could I know anything about him, considering I hadnt
spent more time with him than it takes to piss.
Te man was a war veteran. If you think about the psychological mechanisms behind the
practice of war, it must be clear to you that the success of any war depends on the ability
to weaken the drive to self-preservation. Something like counter-evolution. Gradually,
after years occupied with military operations, a certain portion of the population simply
stops resisting death. Tey learn that death is very close. Tat it is not the exception, but an
everyday occurrence. Tat it can happen quickly and easily. Tat, if you dont pay attention,
you get the recognition of the people around you and, ultimately, a more relaxed pace of
living, because you dont spend energy on fear all the time.
And then, one ne day, the war is over.
Instead of counter-evolution, evolution is back. Everything starts moving forward again,
while our surviving self-destructives are in deep shit, and cant extricate themselves from
Would you be willing to
die for your country?
Right now, at this
moment?
28
the current that carries them contrary to their habit, like infants who come out of the uterus
into the world. Ten the two other conditions which Joiner says lead to suicide are also met:
social isolation and a sense of uselessness.
Tis is the moment when the state should join in.
Join in? Come on, do not give me that. Tis is not a contact radio
show. What should the state do? Create the illusion that they are
useful? Well, there is no such state that could manage to create a
big enough spectacle in which all our former heroes could gure as
stuntmen. Tese are people with permanent changes to the structure
of their personality. Te point is precisely that they are no longer
useful. And not only are they not useful, but they are a nuisance. A state ghting a war
behaves like a man who is building his own house. He must buy bricks, tiles, sand, sanitary
stu. What he doesnt need to buy is his own energy. Te do it yourself guy thinks he has
saved more than his neighbor who has hired a construction company, because he considers
his own invested time and eort to be free. His expenses dont list that item. A state involved
in a war knows it has to buy tanks, bombs and helicopters. But it doesnt have to buy people.
Tey are free, they can be spent for a miserable monthly fee. Te idea that the consumption
of human material during the war can be compensated with money is just as absurd as the
idea that a home owner would pay himself the amount he earned building his own house.
First, it would not be economically logical. Second, who would ever be able to make that
calculation?
I dont know if youre deadly cynical or you really believe it, said Vedran. After all, this was
a homeland war.
Exactly. Which completely frees the state of all responsibility. But the fact that the war was
waged as a defense doesnt change the fact that most people didnt take part in it voluntarily.
So, if they had had to choose between their country and their life, they would generally
have preferred to choose their life. Which is psychologically a very healthy decision. Also,
many of those who decided to join the war didnt do that just for the sake of the countrys
independence. In their minds, independence was synonymous with a better life, improved
standards and a higher position on the social ladder. Tey got neither. Which makes perfect
sense, although people are always for some reason surprised by it. Do you know how many
American Vietnam War veterans committed suicide? Its believed that the number so far
could be as much as 200,000.
You cant compare the two. Tose people fought their war on another continent, and did
not see any meaning in it
But the fact that the war
was waged as a defense
doesnt change the fact
that most people didnt
take part in it voluntarily.
29
Te meaning comes from the inside, not outside. Heres one trivial question: Would you be
willing to die for your country? Right now, at this moment? While Barbara is pregnant with
twins, your mother is buying curtains for the childrens room and you are putting down 400
euros for your apartment? Would you just go somewhere and die, provided that you could
do invaluable service to your countrymen?
Tats the most ridiculous question I have ever heard.
Teres nothing wrong with the question. Only the answer is a bit
tricky. You probably think your knowledge is more useful than your life.
It would be more productive to use you in the eld hospital than send
you to die conquering some unconquerable skin. Which implies that, at the same time,
there are indeed people whose talents are worthless, so the only thing they can oer to
their country is a disruption of their biological cycle. We all know that dierent lives have a
dierent value, its always been like that. Especially in war. Under the banner of protecting
the general interest lies the caste system in the cruelest sense of the term. By the way, Ive
just remembered I have another patient who has all three risk factors according to Joiners
denition. And he is still alive.
Te Gender of Spectres was published by Rende in 2010 for the Serbian market.
Copyright Sladjana Bukovac and Fraktura, 2008.
And then, one ne
day, the war is over.
30
INTERNATIONAL TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE
I wanted to correct what I had done during the war. I got a second chance to do things
right, says Greg Kleven, a former marine in the U.S. military who fought in Vietnam in
1967, in his confession published in Te Christian Science Monitor. Kleven now lives in the
largest Vietnamese city of Ho Chi Minh (formerly called Saigon), where he returned and
settled twenty years after the war. He was the rst American in Saigon after the war, and the
rst to obtain a work permit from the Vietnamese government. He teaches English, and was
practically a pioneer in this eld in this country. I got a chance to be a teacher here, instead
of being a soldier, he adds.
In the US, there are many organizations assisting former American soldiers in their
eorts to visit Vietnam and the sites of battles where they fought, but also, if they so wish,
to contribute through some of the humanitarian programmes, to the recovery of local
Vietnamese communities. Te Vietnam Veterans Restoration Project of the Association of
Vietnam Veterans of America is one such programme among many. In the last seven years,
this organization has sent to Vietnam several dozen groups of Americans (veterans, as well
as those who did not participate in the war), who, together with the local Vietnamese, have
worked on the construction of schools, kindergartens and hospitals in poor provinces.
Te region called A Luoi, which saw some of the most brutal battles of the Vietnam War,
has allowed for the rst time since that war the visits of American veterans, thanks to the
school-building project. Local authorities plan to turn the famous Hamburger Hill, which
was massively bombed during the war, into a tourist destination, and US veterans will be
engaged in this work as well.
Veteran returnees bring with them horric memories of wartime Vietnam. When they see
!American
Soldiers on
the Quest
for Peace in
Vietnam
31
how much the country has developed in the meantime, they are genuinely astonished, says
John Ward, who has been living in Dong Ha for a year.
One of the participants in this project, Wolf Seuling, says his experience has brought
healing he never could have experienced in America. I saw a veteran who went completely
o his PTSD drugs. I believe that I myself have overcome many of my demons. My friends
tell me that I came back a new man, he says.
Te number of veterans from the United States who have visited Vietnam so far through
various programmes remains unknown. Some estimates indicate that several tens of
thousands of them have been involved. In addition, according to the data from the
Vietnamese government, in the last several years more than 400,000 American tourists
have visited this country annually. Many among them, according to Te Christian Science
Monitor, are former veterans. Several hundred former soldiers are permanently settled
there, and are now working with the Vietnamese on various issues related to the legacy of
the war. Many of them are involved in the removal of landmines and planting rice in these
areas, as well as in fund-raising for the disabled, or as tour guides. Tey are also engaged in
the process of reconciliation between the US and Vietnam.
Jelena Grujic Zindovic
Foto: Vietnam
Veterans of America
32
INTERVIEW: Lea David, sociologist and anthropologist
Lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Ben Gurion University in
Israel, Lea David works on the politics of memory and memorialization. She researches
in particular the post-conict contextualization of veterans. For this edition of !Voice she
discusses the relationship of government to the veterans and to the wartime past in the region
of former Yugoslavia.
Wars are key events around which it is, in the end, possible to create a vision of the past that
negates the heretofore accepted pattern of memory. Alternatively, the interpretation of the
war may serve to re-ratify the existing narrative. How a particular war will be treated, largely
depends on the state, i.e. on its ruling elite. Te state has the necessary resources to promote
desirable visions of the past (i.e. those that suit the ruling elite), which it establishes, creates
and sponsors in the form of memorial projects such as monuments, museum programmes,
commemorations, history text books, religion and native language, national holidays
and commemorative dates. Tus, the ruling political elite are able to impose a certain
interpretation of the past in accordance with the needs and demands of the present.
However, although the ruling elite has at its disposal considerable resources of a material,
discursive and symbolic nature, the social segments that have experienced the war-time
suering rst hand are the most important community of memory, motivated to have their
own experiences of the war incorporated in the ocial narrative. Tis is understandable,
because the participants in wars, such as war veterans, refugees and witnesses, are primarily
persons for whose suerings it is important that there be social recognition. Social
!Veterans
Must Be Part
of the Peace-
Building Process
Lea David
33
recognition of these groups can be achieved through a series of specic as well as symbolic
acts: through the law regulating their rights and concrete material benets, through
symbolic and psychological acts such as various commemorative practices, or through
according them a privileged position in society.
What are the dierences with respect to how the veterans are treated in the post-
Yugoslav countries?
It is particularly interesting to compare how the dierent
states of the former Yugoslavia treat war veterans, since the
attitude towards them fairly accurately reveals the given states
relationship to the wars of the past. Tus, for example, the
attitude of the ruling elites in Croatia to Croatian war veterans
is radically dierent from the attitude of the authorities in
Serbia to Serbian veterans. In Croatia, the war veterans are not
only the strongest and most inuential community of memory,
but also a signicant social body with strong political inuence.
Croatia emerged from the war as the winner, and in this respect, promotion of veterans as
national heroes went hand in hand with the ruling elites aspirations not only to verify and
strengthen their own positions and to neutralize other potentially competing narratives
about the war of the 1990s, but also to promote a desirable form of a rather narrowly dened
national identity.
In Serbia, on the contrary, the veterans are extremely marginalized and
stigmatized. Not only do they have almost no political inuence (despite several failed
attempts), but they are consistently divided from society the political elite through legal
regulations and budgets, which eectively neutralize their potential political inuence,
and eliminate them from public discourse. Since the regime change in 2000, the following
strategy has been tacitly adopted: divide and conquer! Te idea was quite simple to
prevent the creation of an ecient veterans front by assigning dierent privileges to
dierent groups of veterans. Te scandal involving per diem payment for the war in Kosovo
that ended in the lawsuit of a veterans against Serbia before the European Court of Human
Rights, is just one example of this practice. For instance, we can see that only in Belgrade
do the veterans receive a 50 percent discount on their utilities bill, which is not the case
in other cities. Te veterans survival largely depends on the relation of local authorities
towards them. Hence, in the municipality of Belgrade, some districts allocate part of their
budget to veterans - ukarica is a case in point. Some municipalities do not openly support
veterans, but there is a tacit understanding that everyone looks the other way, as for example
in Rakovica, where the association the Serbian war veterans, in addition to erecting,
Croatian veterans are so
powerful that there is no space
for public debate and a review
of the narrative about the
past, while in Serbia veterans
remain completely isolated and
marginalized, and their voices
unheard.
34
without permission and in violation of all procedures, a memorial plaque dedicated to the
Rakovica soldiers who died in the war, illegally built a structure for their own oce. Te
situation is similar in Zemun. Consequently, even though the relationships of the Croatian
and Serbian elites towards veterans are radically dierent, both have resulted in the
prevention of open and public debate on the responsibility for what happened in the wars of
the 1990s. Croatian veterans are so powerful that there is no space for public debate and a
review of the narrative about the past, while in Serbia, veterans remain completely isolated
and marginalized, and their voices unheard.
What is the relationship of civil society and antiwar NGOs to veterans?
Te situation with the veterans in Serbia is worsened by the fact
that the entire veteran population is almost entirely rejected
by the civil society, whom the latter perceives as the cause of
war, although the motives and causes of the war were utterly
dierent. Tey are hated, while their problems, which are real,
are largely ignored. Teir stories are radically varied from those
who understand their own participation in the war as the greatest mistake of their life,
to those who believe that, although they are not recognized by the state or society as a
whole, their ghting was the highest act of patriotism. But a large part of them simply
found themselves on the battleeld. Either they were in military service, or they were
drafted (some by force, and many because they thought that it was their duty), or some
joined as volunteers, and then found themselves on a battleeld from which there was no
going back. Many returned from the battleeld in terrible poverty and although some
believed that they would nd it easier to nd a job as returnees from the war, the opposite
happened. Rejection by the wider society and the state led to a further deterioration in
their condition. PTSD, alcoholism, domestic violence and, ultimately, murder and suicide
all that has been the result of this negligence. It is, therefore, important to understand
that they dont care much about truth or reconciliation they care about the minimum
standard of living and just a bit of human attention. Or, as one of the veterans said: Dont
talk to me about reconciliation! Better you give me money for my wife to go to a spa, so
she can see some better days!
So that, I think, is the rst step towards a lasting peace a shift in perception, although that
process is somewhat reminiscent of the chicken and egg paradox: civil society has to reach
out to veterans and help them integrate back into society, while the veterans must make
progress toward understanding the broader context of the consequences of their war. It is, of
course, a long and dicult process, but in my opinion, it is inevitable and any further delay
makes the process of reconciliation and lasting peace rather illusory.
Rejection by the
wider society and the
state leads to further
deterioration of their
condition.
35
Why is it important to get the veterans involved in the process of reconciliation and
peace-building?
Primarily because ignoring those segments of society that have a dierent vision of the
future and the past simply cannot bring the desired results. It is necessary to include not
only those veterans who are ready for reconciliation the platform should be available to
everyone, even if one part of the veteran community is against reconciliation, even if their
point of view is entirely nationalistic and exclusive. My opinion is that it is always better that
all narratives be public and generally known, then for them to remain hidden and potentially
explosive. To fail to include the veterans means to create, once again, a community of
memory allowed only in the private sphere, which is what happened after the Second World
War and we know very well what happened in that case.
What is your view of the process of reconciliation in the former Yugoslavia?
It limps. However, I dont think that reconciliation is the most important condition for co-
eistence. I think that nations and individuals can live well enough with each other and get
along even without reconciliation.
Which instrument of transitional justice has given the best results in this region so far?

Name and surname
Organisation
Country
Address
Email
Website
Phone

Sign
For your own sake.
So that everybody knows. Lest we forget.
So it doesnt happen again. To move on.
Join RECOM Coalition
36
Documentation centers. I think that the importance of documentation is still generally
misunderstood and underestimated by which I mean, its real value and the symbolic value
that documentation can provide to the victims of war.
How do you see the Initiative for RECOM?
As very important - but again, with no real platform for veterans, it seems to me that this
initiative will not be able to create a really durable peace-building process.
Jelena Grujic Zindovic

Name and surname
Country
Address
Email
Registration number
ID card number
Passport number
Driver licence number
Sign
For your own sake.
So that everybody knows. Lest we forget.
So it doesnt happen again. To move on.
Sign for Establishing RECOM
37
THE RECOM PROCESS
Te debate about the best way to uncover the truth and for
truth-telling about the past was launched in May 2006 at
the First Regional Forum for Transitional Justice, organized
by the Humanitarian Law Center (Serbia), the Research
and Documentation Center (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
and Documenta (Croatia). At the Forum, participants
representatives of NGOs and associations of missing
persons and victims from the successor countries of the
former Yugoslavia committed to a regional approach in the
establishment of the facts about war crimes, arguing that the
war had taken place in more than one country, and that in most
cases victims and perpetrators did not reside in the same state.
Te Coalition for the founding of a Regional Commission for
Establishing the Facts About War Crimes and Other Gross
Violations of Human Rights Committed on the Territory
of the Former Yugoslavia (RECOM) was constituted at the
Fourth Regional Forum for Transitional Justice on October
28, 2008 in Pristina/Prishtin. Over the course of three years,
through intensive consultations across the former Yugoslavia,
with over 6,000 participants, the Initiative for RECOM
prompted the most extensive social debate ever in this region.
Based on the proposals, requests, needs and views of the
participants in the consultative process, a Draft Statute was
drawn up and presented to the public on March 26, 2011. It
was then submitted, together with more than half a million
signatures in support of the process, to the highest state
institutions of the countries in the region.
In October 2011, a regional team of Public Advocates for
RECOM was established to press for the nal stage of the
RECOM Process. Te states in the region have been requested
to institute an independent, inter-state regional commission
for the establishment of the facts about all victims of war
crimes and other serious human rights violations committed
on the territory of the former Yugoslavia between 1991 and
2001. Te ocial position of the Coalition for RECOM is that
RECOMs main task should be to establish the facts about war
crimes and to compile a list of all casualties, killed and missing
persons and that the nal decision on other objectives and
tasks should be made by the governments of the region who
will jointly establish RECOM.
Te main goal of !Te Voice is to provide information about the
RECOM Process to the members of the Coalition for RECOM,
to the many supporters of the Initiative and to all those
interested in its development. In addition to this, !Te Voice
focuses on the progress of transitional justice in the region.
It is available in in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian/Montenegrin,
Albanian, English, Macedonian and Slovenian.
38
18/2014
April

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